WORLD URBAN YOUTH FORUM
NANJING, CHINA

United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) held the Third session of the World Urban Forum in Vancouver, Canada 2006, which drew some 10,000 participants from over 100 countries.

That is after having held the successful first session of the World Urban Forum in 2002, in Nairobi Kenya and the second session of the World Urban Forum in Barcelona, Spain 13-17 September 2004.

The Fourth session of the World Urban Forum will be held in China, Nanjing 03-07 November, 2008. The forum is convened pursuant to the resolution of 18th session of the Commission on Human Settlements aimed at facilitating the exchange of experiences and the advancement of collective knowledge among cities and their development partners, and designed to be a nonlegislative technical forum. Participation in the World Urban Forum is open to representatives of national governments, local authorities and other Habitat Agenda Partners.

This includes global parliamentarians on habitat, the youth, women groups, non governmental organizations, community based organizations, human settlement professionals, research institutions and academic of science, the private business and non profit sectors, foundations, relevant United Nations organizations and other international agencies. In the space of just six years, UN-HABITAT’s World Urban Forum has established itself as the leading platform on urban development.

The success of the WUF can be attributed to the fact that it provides a unique opportunity for dialogue between government leaders, local authorities, non government organizations, grassroots movements, urban professional, youth, women and the private sector. Through a variety of large and small scale events, participants have an unparallel opportunity to discuss and debate with leading authorities from around the world on the future of urbanization in general and on their cities in particular.

At the Fourth World Urban Forum 03-07 November, 2008 in Nanjing, China, efforts are being made to mobilize resources with a view of increasing the participation and contribution of Habitat Agenda Partners such as Local authorities, NGOs, women groups and youth representatives that are working towards meeting the goals of the Habitat Agenda and Millennium Development Goals for sustainable urbanization. Participation of government representatives, youth, women and civil society representatives including those from the less developed countries will be important in ensuring successful outcomes from the forthcoming session of the World Urban Forum.

The World Urban Youth Forum (WUYF) is expected to be held prior to the main World Urban Forum from 31 October, 2008 to 2 November, 2008. In 2006 the youth forum was held three days prior to the Third Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF III) in Vancouver, Canada. This provided youth with the opportunity to articulate their issues among themselves in order to make meaningful contribution at the main forum. This format was adopted following a request by youth attending the second session of the World Urban Forum in Barcelona, Spain, that UN-HABITAT brings young people more into the fold by having a conference several days prior to the main forum.

The focus of the 2006 WUYF was to promote and recognize youth-led initiatives, projects, programmes and action in cities inline with the theme of Changing ideas into action. The Forum brought together over 450 youth from over 40 countries around the world. The selected delegates were identified as being agents of change already actively working on projects and a broad variety of urban themes promoting action towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals. WUYF delegates also participated in UN-HABITAT’s WUF III the following week.

The World Youth Forum 2008 will be held from 31 October, 2008 to 2 November, 2008. Participation of youth in WUF IV is very crucial mainly because youth shall be part of all the discussions on how to deal with growing poverty in cities, rapid urbanization, unemployment, disasters and the scourge of climate change. During the WUYF 2006 youth were recognized for their initiatives, projects, programmes and action in cities. The expectation in the WUYF 2008 is to build on the activities of the previous Youth Forum while still working within the context of the WUF-IV theme of Harmonious Urbanization: The Challenge of Balanced Territorial Development; youth will be able to make contributions towards harmonious urbanization. Youth will also need to, among others issues, explore how the different generational interests in an urban context can be reconciled, particularly how the interest of the youth and older generations can contribute towards harmonious urbanization.

Sourced from UN-HABITAT website

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